


Promising Beginnings

by jedi_penguin



Category: Pundit & Broadcast Journalist RPF (US)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-12-24
Updated: 2008-12-24
Packaged: 2018-01-25 07:31:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1639070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jedi_penguin/pseuds/jedi_penguin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The real reason Keith loves his Bill O'Reilly finger-puppet so much.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Promising Beginnings

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to sandbar592 for the beta
> 
> Written for Severuslovesme

 

 

The first time they noticed a physical attraction, it was impossible to say who was more appalled. Keith dropped his little Bill-O finger puppet under his desk and they both bent to reach it at the same moment. Their faces came within millimeters of each other and the cramped space under the desk was suddenly flooded with pheromones.

"This can't happen," Rachel said firmly.

"Certainly not," Keith agreed fervently. "I have a girlfriend."

"You have a girlfriend?" Rachel asked incredulously. "What about **my** girlfriend?!?"

Keith swallowed nervously. "Well yes, there is that..."

"Hey, you two," yelled the producer. "Are you two coming out of there any time soon? Commercial break's almost over!"

~*~*~

Rachel spent the rest of the show convincing herself that that moment under the desk was a fluke. She was willing to concede the possibility that Keith might be reasonably good-looking, but really, what did she know about it? He had the wrong genitalia, and therefore, it was impossible for her to be attracted to him. _Ipso facto_ , case closed. 

The only reason she couldn't stop staring at his silver hair was because Susan had given her an appreciation for older lovers. No, women! Older women. And Keith's facility with his impressive vocabulary didn't impress her. At all. Really.

~*~*~

Keith wondered when he would run out of names to call himself. Sexual fantasies about lesbians were so unoriginal, so stereotypical, so chauvinistic, so misogynistic, so, so, so... GOP-ish. 

But she has the sweetest smile he'd ever seen. And a doctorate in political science. And God help him, but she looks better in a suit than he does.

~*~*~

Within a fortnight, Keith broke up with his girlfriend, Katy. He told himself that the timing was a complete coincidence; his concurrent request for Rachel to appear on his show was harder to justify.

Her polite refusal had nothing to do with his exceptionally vehement rant the next day. Really.

~*~*~

Susan and Rachel had an amicable separation a few months later.

Rachel's invitation to Keith for a guest appearance on her show was pure chance. His eager acceptance may not have been.

~*~*~

Rachel's glasses fell under her desk within seconds of the first commercial break. (Actually, Keith pushed them off, but only because they were out of Rachel's reach.) Both went under the desk to retrieve them.

"Well. Here we are again," Rachel observed with a nervous grin.

"I was sorry to hear about you and Susan."

"No, you weren't."

Keith smiled. "No, I wasn't."

"I'm still gay," Rachel warned him.

"You've just come out of a long-term homosexual relationship," Keith quibbled. "That doesn't prove anything. The Kinsey Report argues that no one is 100% anything. And you're breathing hard."

"Both our heads are below our knees. We're suffering oxygen deprivation."

Keith grinned more broadly than before. "We should-"

Vanessa interrupted him from across the room. "Ten seconds until we're back on air. In your places, people!"

Rachel shrugged. "Producers."

~*~*~

Instead of going back to his office, Keith stayed in the green room until Rachel's show ended. The food was crappier here and he wanted to be hungry for dinner.

"Great show," he boomed as soon as she entered the room. 

She ignored the compliment, instead giving him a plaintive look. "Why are we doing this, Keith? We can't possibly work."

"I don't know," Keith mused. "David Bauder once called you my soul mate, and he seems like a pretty intelligent person. Certainly one helluva reporter."

Rachel laughed quietly. "He called me your **political** soul mate. That's not exactly the same as whatever it is we're doing..."

"Then let's do something political," Keith suggested. "Strobe Talbott is giving a speech tonight; perhaps we could go out to pizza afterwards?"

"The president of the Brookings Institute and greasy Italian food? You really know how to woo a girl, Keith!"

"I don't care about girls," he confided in her ear. "I'm trying to bag a Rhodes' Scholar."

Rachel burst into gales of laughter. "Good luck with that! Just don't go around tomorrow saying 'Mission Accomplished'."

"No, that never ends well." He gave her a speculative look. "Will we? End well?"

"I don't know. We've got a good start, however."

Keith gave a huge smile, the one he normally reserved for a particularly unintelligent Bill-O moment, and Rachel grinned back. It was, indeed, a good start.

THE END

 


End file.
